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The first steps of a visual storyteller
Bruno Bigh

Following your ambitions eventually always pays off. Bruno Bigh, an artist from Brazil, is currently working on his own comic book and multiple other projects are in works as well. As a student graphic design and illustration Bruno’s drive has never been bigger. He talks about himself and his ideas in this week’s article.

What is drawing to you?”To me, drawing is as important as breathing. If I get through the day without drawing I feel like I’m suffocating. Drawing is everything to me. I feel like everyone needs a way to express themselves. Not by only using words, but also physically. You need to transmit what’s in your head, to the physical world. Sharing what you’re feeling and what you’re thinking about is so important. Drawing is my way to share my mind with the world.”

That’s really cool perspective. What inspires the things you share?”My initial influences were comic books. I used to read all these Spider-Man comics, those were my favourites. But as I grew up, I discovered more kinds of art, such as movies, because I love using art to tell a story. The first movies that blew me away was the Star Wars trilogy, the original of course. My favourite genre is science-fiction. I like seeing the impossible become reality. I’ve got loads of Star Wars art books on a shelf above my desk, which is where I get my references. Another inspiration of mine is photography, a great example is my favourite photographer Sebastião Salgado, a Brazilian photographer. The first time I saw a picture by him I was about ten or eleven, that first image blew me away. It was black and white and had so much emotion, which is why Salgado became such a big influence to my work.”

I noticed you collaborate a lot with other artists. Why so?”When you make art with another artist you tend to create a new language. It’s not your language, but it’s not theirs either. I feel like every time I do a collab I discover a new way to speak. It’s always nice to see what that new language will look like. When I’m working with someone else I get results I would never achieve on my own. It’s a good way to get out of your comfort zone, and reach new limits you never knew even existed.”

What is Mind Maker Magazine?”Mind Maker Magazine is a little, ten-page zine I did a while back. I actually planned to do more of those, but as Froggo came up I got other priorities. The zine has eight illustrations of cyborg body parts. It’s more illustrative than narrative. I was really into robots and machinery at the time and I wanted to practice drawing mechanical parts, to challenge myself.”

Let’s talk about some of your current projects. What exactly is Froggo?”Froggo is the main character in a comic I’m working on. He’s basically a mixture of a frog and a magic being, a Rana Amphibian, which is a species I created. He’s the king of a village in the swamps. His people only consists of men that work like ants all day, and sleep all night. As the people Froggo rules over are already well organized they don’t need their king’s help. Froggo has no real task, and is just a public figure, which is why he has loads of free time. Throughout the day he wanders around and develops a curiosity. Why are there no women? How did we even get born? There his quest to discover his people’s origin begins.”

How about the smoke person on your Instagram page? The description says it’s becoming a zine.”Oh yeah, that smoke person is part of a collaboration I did with some friends of mine. We wanted to make a bundle of three different stories, that have the same theme. There’s a little poem with each illustration. The smoke person reflects on me being in a really bad place, as I was going through a rough phase back then. He kind of depicts what I was feeling. That smoke person is physically there, but when you try to touch him and reach out, he’s not. I made something dark and heavy to look at, which is a perfect example of how I transmit my feelings by drawing. All pictures are connected by the poems, but only if you interpret it that way. It’s possible to see them as singular pieces as well.”

”Falling in all his temptations,
the illusion is big.
Up to the point
he could swear he is flying.

The man, full of believing in himself,
opens his eyes to his reflection.
the brief sigh of innocence is enough
to blind him before the truth.

Looking to be,
Looking for being.
How much can I be?
Everything, he wanted.
But himself was all he could see.

Looking at the stars,
the man felt infinite.
As a whole, like everything else,
now would be forever,
now.”

I noticed you were working on a comic with your brother. Could you tell me more about that project?”It’s still a work in progress. We got together and I asked him if he wanted to write a script for a comic book. My brother studies cinema right here in Brazil, his goal in life is to be a script writer for movies. We started having ideas and gathered all the references we wanted to throw into our story, which will be a mixture of sci-fi and steampunk. Yes, we know these styles are set in completely different centuries. The story’s supposed to be in Russia, which was the one condition my brother had. He’s fanatic about Russian literature. The main character is a little cyborg girl, named Natasha. She lives on a train and doesn’t know anything about her family or why she was created. Natasha wants to find meaning to her life, figure out what she’s meant to be. In this world cyborgs are workers and humans don’t have to do shit. There’s a very clear hierarchy, which causes humans to treat cyborgs like trash. It’s kind of like Froggo discovering what he is and where he comes from. This theme is something I want to figure out for myself as well. What am I doing here? What should I be doing?”

If you liked Bruno’s work and story you can find more of his work on his Instagram or is Facebook page. Bruno Bigh’s very first comic book, his passion project, will be released soon. We hope you liked reading our content and that you will visit On-Art.nl in the future.